The Denver Nuggets star on life without cornrows, becoming a CEO in the NBA, and, in real time, the fate of Balloon Boy

Carmelo Anthony is tired. Not of the LeBron comparisons, nor last season's Kobe hangover, nor that alleged DUI — by all accounts, he's happy, healthy, and ready to lead Denver back into the breach. Still, there's no getting past the fact that he's tired. He's tired from a daylong flight back from China, where he dropped another forty-five in another Nuggets preseason win. (He's averaging about a point a minute.) The twenty-five-year-old picks up the phone after a post-touchdown practice, just as six-year-old Falcon Heene is thought to be missing over the nearby Colorado desert.

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ESQUIRE.COM: You've done quite a bit of traveling during the past couple of years, which must give you some perspective on the rest of the world, and it on you. Did you get a lot of attention over there — especially now, without the cornrows?

CARMELO ANTHONY: It just makes you appreciate what we have over here. But, yeah, I got a lot — it was just time. I had always had 'em since I was a little kid, off and on. When I was two I had 'em. I was always attached to 'em somehow, but I had to do it — I had had 'em for ten years straight.

ESQ: When those came off, did some people not recognize you at first?

CA: I still get people here and there who say, "I didn't realize that was you!" Well, my hair's been cut for a year now, so —

ESQ: Thinking about making any other big changes? You've got some tattoos.

CA: Yeah, I don't think I'm getting rid of those anytime soon. I might. You never know.

ESQ: Seems like you've become a pretty snappy dresser for an NBA player. But how important is it for an NBA player to dress well, really?

CA: When you're going to games, you're going to work — and that's something that, over the years, I've had to gravitate to. The NBA's a Fortune 500 company. That's how you look at it. And all the other Fortune 500 companies out there in the world, you don't see their CEOs and COOs going to work with white tees and baggy clothes and stuff like that. So I have to take that same approach.

ESQ: But your stylist maintains that the one thing you won't ever wear is a bowtie.

CA: Yeah. [Laughs.] I ain't ready to take that step. That's the next step — that's a big step. I had to take a step from white tees to button-ups to suits and ties, but that's just not me.

ESQ: Something that is all yours is the new Jordan Melo M6 shoe. Or did you just kind of sign off on designs?

CA: Some people probably don't even have that much input into their shoe, but I'm there from Day One, from the ideas — coming up with what's most important at that time in my life — to the messages, to the materials, to the shoe. I'm there every step of the way with it.

ESQ: I know you've been to Beijing and back recently, but did you hear about the kid earlier today supposedly went up —

CA: Yeah, and I just found out while we've been on the phone that he's safe. He was hiding... in his attic. Crazy.